Confronting your demons

Confrontation is not my strong point. I am, like many people I know, really good at telling the story of what I should’ve said or what I might say, but rarely did I or do I say it. At least not to the face of the person who needs to hear it. All my life, I have had this fear of being wrong and I think that, more than anything, plays into my fear of confrontation. I also have always seemed to understand that there are two sides to every situation and I’m always worried that my side is not really what happened. I can’t stand the thought of having an arguement with someone, only to find out that what I think happened didn’t happen at all. I don’t know why. There’s nothing I can pin point from childhood- no friend or relative who did this constantly and helped instill this fear. And yet it’s there.

But sometimes- and only sometimes- I know I am right. There is no guilt, no worry about seeing the situation from someone else’s point of view because I feel good about what I’m doing in that situation. I am in that situation right now. I have decided to end a friendship, based on the actions of the other person. It is true- I can see it from their side- why they felt slighted or jipped or even deserving. But nothing- NOTHING- can explain away their behavior to me. We are adults and while I know that emotions can run high, especially where money is concerned, there is a right way and a wrong way to handle things.

And the wrong way could lose you friends.

Even in that second-guessing stage- the one after the fight or disagreement where you look back and question if you did or said the right thing or even if your response is the right one… even in that stage, I know I have made the correct decision. It will not be easy. I will run into this person at parties and gatherings. People, at some point, will forget about the situation (or will never even know about it) and wonder why we don’t hang out anymore or why I’m not coming to a small gathering when this person is around. I may actually become so detatched myself that I will go to those gatherings and could even have pleasant conversations with this person again. And if it comes down to to a confrontation, I feel like I could calmly explain my side and my reasoning with no fear of the other point of view (that’s not to say the other person would behave the same- in fact, I could almost be certain that they would not). But I’m not worried about it. Because in this situation, it’s not the side that matters. I do truly understand why you feel the way you do. What I do not understand is how you could think the way you did about us and then react the way you did. And that is where my side comes in. So tell my husband that you know how upset I am and you want to make it right. Tell him that you never meant for it to happen like this. Convince yourself that you are the bigger person. The truth is- you’re not. If you were, none of this would’ve happened in the first place.

So we will not be friends again. And there is not a fiber in my being that questions that decision. Not one. Not one regret, not one ‘what-if’. Because I have seen the true colors and I don’t like them.